“Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit and they shall be created. And You shall renew the face of the earth.”
The Sacrament of Confirmation is one of the great mysteries we celebrate in the Church. At the prayer offered above begins to help us see the power of faith in God and how we, when we open our hearts to receive this faith, are changed and change the world. As many of our teens receive this Sacrament this weekend we can reflect on the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives.
What happens when the Holy Spirit comes? Well, everything changes. And that means everything, not just somethings, not just the things we want to change…everything changes.
It is always good to think about a few Holy Spirit moments in our lives and see how things have changed. Some of may think, “I don’t think I’ve had a Holy Spirit Moment?” I do hope you are wrong so I’m going to share a few Holy Spirit moments….
It was the winter of 1991. I was teaching at Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha Academy at St. Bonaventure Indian Mission in Throreau NM. (that’s a mouth full) It was Christmas break and I took off for a few days of camping in the mountains of New Mexico to be alone with my thoughts and prayers as I pondered what I was to do. I had been at the mission for 18 months and I needed a decision to either continue or return to California and continue with my life. I hiked in and arrived at my camp site, pitched the tent, built the fire and began collecting enough wood to last through the cold night. And then, I began to pray. I remember the silence, the occasional rustle of the wind, the tweet of a bird the trickle of the stream a few yards away. I remember the stillness engulfing me as I prayed. I knew deep down that I couldn’t stay at the mission but I didn’t want to admit it to myself. I knew that my spiritual life was not strong enough to live out this missionary call and the daily hurts were beginning to slowly erode the joy of working with my fellow missionaries and serving the people but I didn’t want to admit this either. Finally, I simply whispered to God…”I guess I need to go back to California.”…and a wave of peace flowed over me so strong that I knew the way God desired me to go…this was the fire of the Holy Spirit sending me forth to a new mission. And I changed.
In June of 1985 everything seemed fine. I was working in Seattle and beginning to attend community college after my discharge from the Marine Corps. I was settling down and looking forward to the blessings of life…then I received the phone call that my father had died. I still remember clearly the tearing of my heart and the tears and cries engulfing me. For months after that morning I was frozen, functioning but not really living at all. After attending a Mariners game one afternoon I did something I had never done before and at the time I couldn’t have told you why but I left the King Dome and then got off the bus in downtown and walked into St. James Cathedral and just sat down. It was there, in my mind, where I began to scream at God full volume. I did, what I have learned from praying the Psalms, the very act of pouring out my grief and pain with all my heart. Finally when my prayer ended , exhausted and empty, I felt the warmth of peace fill me. It was the physical sensation the slowed my heart beat and surrounded me in a way that cannot be described. The peace of the Holy Spirit began to heal the wounds of sorrow. And I changed.
Our hope is as our young people receive the Sacrament of Confirmation this weekend at St. Lucy each of them will be filled with the light, the fire, the breath of the Holy Spirit and do the work our Heavenly Father desires as their mission to renew the face of the earth.
In prayer we discover God’s Holy Spirit accompanying and moving us in the direction of holiness. So we pray.
“O, God, who by the light of the Holy Spirit, did instruct the hearts of the faithful, grant that by the same Holy Spirit we may be truly wise and ever enjoy His consolations, Through Christ Our Lord, Amen.”
God Bless Fr. Mark